Page:Spiritual Reflections for Every Day in the Year - Vol 1.pdf/233



HERE does instinct end and reason begin? Reason is not a continuation of instinct, or a more refined order of it, but totally another thing. Instinct is a connate power planted at creation in the mind of the brute, to enable the creature to act in such and such a way, so as to be able to preserve its being from enemies, to procure food, to propagate and preserve its kind, and to do all things for the safety and comfort of its own existence. Instinct is never improved, but remains the same in all ages. The training of animals to perform some wonderful tricks, is nothing more than teaching a parrot to speak, while the bird, like the echo, is unconscious of the meaning of the words it utters. The bird that built its nest in a certain form a thousand years ago, builds it in the same form now. Not so with man: the huts of a savage age pass away, and, in an enlightened one, are succeeded by comfortable mansions and palaces. The animals are born into all the science that is necessary for their existence, above which they never rise: this, their birth-perfection is their imperfection. Man, on the other hand, is born without any knowledge, but with faculties, by the exercise of which he can obtain much. He has it all to acquire by education, experience, and thought, and is capable of an everlasting growth. This, his birth-imperfection, is his perfection, as no limits can be put to human improvement either here or hereafter. Reason is the human